Arriving back in the hotel suite, Kate remembered the words in the angel song. The lyrics mentioned a hotel, a —'dark, cold, hotel room'. —She smiled wryly —here she was...
One by one, members of their 'team' arrived. Richard and two guards who now leaned on the walls of the small sitting-room in Amma and Kate's hotel room, eating snacks, numbered seven with Bruce and the doctor who sat in one of the four armchairs. From discussion she heard, she believed that others in Richard's employ were ensconced in the motels.
This suite had three bedrooms; Kate and Amma shared one while Bruce and the doctor took the other two. The sitting-room was a duplicate of others in the three family apartments. Around twenty years old, this hotel was the most modern in the town with a total of thirty rooms available for singles or doubles.
When they arrived in the early hours, yes, this was a dark, cold, hotel room as in the song. They would stay this one more night and leave at 2am for the short journey to the airport where they'd 'fly away' in Amma's private jet.
To arrive and leave in darkness had been Richard's demand. To leave and meet back at the airport in separate cars should help them not be perceived for the group they were.
How her father had arrived in the town, no one knew. It was suggested he'd come with Jerry and his two personal guards. This idea was grave indeed. For him to be in the pay of their dread enemies was bad news.
Kate felt somewhat threatened to know he could be in her house, going through her things. She realised, more was happening in the background of all that she knew about her father's being here and why this trip to this town for her funeral had been planned.
The small town named Brookfield had three hotels and two motels, with other accomodation being a large camping site for R.V's, trailers and tents as well as self-contained beach cabins. The beach was only a quarter of a mile away, with more camping grounds and fast-food places, cafes, jetties and wharves for visiting holiday yachts to birth their sea-vessels. Fishing trips could be arranged —it was fishing that was the biggest attraction.
Bruce had overheard that Kate's father had asked to have one of the two town policemen break-in to the house where Kate had lived alone. He'd asked to be allowed to sleep there. It had been her mother's home, left to her when she was but a child of six years old. He said his daughter, Kate, made it her home. He, as her last living relative could surely be granted this one request.
Whether or not Kate's father had permission from the police to do such a thing was yet to be learned, but Richard and the others doubted he would be allowed without a court injunction. Kate had never thought of writing a will.
Kate's income, a monthly grant from her mother's estate, had been substantial enough for her to live comfortably. When she was a school-girl here, a nanny and butler had cared for her in the house as a stipulation in her mother's will.
To have something meaningful to do, she'd volunteered as a part-time librarian at the local school and helped look after the gardens around the church building. Everything else she did with her time was among her most guarded secrets. She never went to movies, watched television or online videos. Her lap-top was used to talk with Richard and Amma and she kept her household and personal accounts on it. A small wireless colour-copy laser printer was on a desk in the living room of the house. She had used it to print photographs she captured with her Fone-Cam.
Kate wondered, now, about the huge mansion 'Brooklands', more like a small palace with extensive gardens that Amma owned, twelve miles from here, set in the country. It had its own helipad. Why couldn't we all stay there? —She questioned herself; she'd learned that Amma had her own secrets. She was a very private person but not distant towards Kate at all. Other than seeing Amma at church and sometimes being taken for lunch at the beach or to a cafe with her, Kate had visited her at least thrice a year and Amma had told her that if ever she needed, she could go there any time, or call for a driver to fetch her. It was the main thing that gave Kate a feeling of security and closeness with this wonderfully friendly, motherly woman.
"I wish you'd change your minds and let me go to my home," Kate said, knowing these words would likely fall on closed ears. She added quickly, "There's enough security in you all to make sure we're safe. I do need my contact lenses and there are important belongings of mine there."
"Don't you think you'd be seen, and what right would you tell them that you are there? What can't you live without?" Doctor Foreman asked, adding, "We said we'll replace your Fone-Cam and the contact lenses when you decide on the color. You need to make that choice soon but as we said, not green."
"My computer, my books; but, yes, you're right, I can live without them or they can be replaced, but not my photographs, oh and my special watch. They're not at the house. I have a locker somewhere... It has a code to unlock it. I keep my treasures in it. I can walk there, it's close."
"Is it at the school?" Amma asked.
"What did you keep in it?" Richard queried, at the same time.
Her eyes on Amma, she replied to Richard, "If he needs to know, his letters..." she changed her focus to Richard, saying, "... and some photos —other... private, personal thing, what you'd likely call... stuff..."
He stood, leaning on the door jam, half between the corridor and the room, as if he didn't want to be in the same room with her; at least this was her perception of him... "You're right though, Richard, those letters aren't important to you or to me or our future and the only other treasures I have, are two music boxes, a locket and a ring that belonged to my mother, and my watch. I'd like to retrieve two ornament pieces that my grandmother owned. I've kept them in that locker for years and they do mean a lot to me; something that ties me to my past. My father wanted me to give them to him to take care of but I believe he would have sold them off. I've never told him about the locker. Likely he'll search my house for them."
Richard's face had shown he was taken aback at her claim about the letters and her words. He'd bowed his head and kept silent.
The dart with words she'd sent him also pierced her too...
"We must fetch them." Amma said with a final note in her voice. "Jewelry and heirlooms can't be replaced, nor can the letters. Where are they, Kate? At the library?"
"No, they..." she stopped. To tell them where they were would mean that Richard would learn one of her most guarded secrets... but then, she thought, anyone here in Brookfield would know that I go there a lot. It's been no secret to the people here... Richard could already know...
An idea sprang in her mind so quickly there wasn't time to think of the ramifications. "If you tell me one of your secrets, Richard, I'll tell you my most guarded one, but likely, you already know..."
An electric charge seemed to dart around the room, piercing the silence.
Kate broke it, saying, "I feel sure these people here with us, certainly our Amma, they know all about you, so why shouldn't I know something too?" Twisting her head to the side, she pursed her lips, raised her eyebrows and looked coyly at him.
He wasn't silent for long before she spoke again, "Do I have to keep this hideous wig on? —At my own celebration? So far, we're having a great time, aren't we."
Pulling hairpins out of the wig, she pulled it off, tossing it across the room. It flew past the shaggy rug and slid across the polished wooden floor to land at Richard's feet. His eyes weren't on the wig but on her short golden, auburn hair. Less than two inches long, it was a mass of curls. She looked like a fourteen or fifteen year-old, only more innocent.
Kate asked another question, "Why don't we go to your place, Amma? Brooklands has a lot more space there and I could swim in your indoor heated pool. These boots with the double water-filling linings have been made too thick and restrictive. I long to take them off, but know I can't..."
"There are people watching Brooklands too," Amma replied, raising her eyebrows and tightening her lips together.
"What people?"
"We saw some of them at the cemetery, they have cohorts in town and out on the roads, the countryside. We don't know how many. Just as they don't know how many we have and as we suspect them, they will be the same toward us; very wary."
All eyes looked to Richard who hadn't spoken... Amma urged, "Oh, for peanuts sake, Richard, tell her who you really are..."
Looking up at Kate, he said, "If it's the last resort you can think up, Kate, I'll tell you some things about me —but only after you tell me where your locker is and why it's such a secret." He smiled at her and said, "I see one of your secrets is that you must have used a hair-straightener before and also you bleached out the orange tones."
"It's only curly when it's this short. It hasn't been this short, well, I can't remember when it ever was this short." She shrugged and said, "'Carrot tops' was my name for too long and before I let you face-time me on the computer, I bleached the red out of it. And, yes, I did use a straightener sometimes because when its long, it gets kinks in it. Call me vain, but I didn't want green eyes if I had red hair. I wanted to be blonde, not red.
"These are the first and last secrets I'll tell you, Richard, as my last resort, so I can hear your last resort truth." She grinned. Drawing a deep breath, she divulged, "The locker's in the gym where I spent all my spare time, sometimes a whole day. And to expand this one and only secret I'm telling, I used a black costume with a hood and mask to exercise there when people were there, it was thing quite a few of them did and it suited my cause to be more private. I earned a black belt in Karate and the highest awards in four other kinds of martial arts. I practised a combination of them all. Enough of that...
"The locker is number one hundred and seven; one, zero, seven, and the code consists of six letters —your birthday date and mine combined, not the year, just the month and day numbers — 6-12-6-28.
"I need to rest. Good night."
Holding to the arms of the chair, she stood. Grabbing the walking stick, she hobbled across the room to the door of the bedroom where Amma and her slept last night.
Feeling guilty for the way she'd spoken, she turned and said, "I'm sure you'll wake me before 2am. And do forgive me for being outspoken and rude. I seem to know less about myself even though my memory is back. It's either the pain meds I'm on, or, I might have got my cantankerousness from my father. I'm done for today..."
Entering the bedroom, she closed the door and leaned back on in, hearing Richard's laughter. "Last resort indeed!" she heard him say, "But, I will go to the gym, now, or as soon as we can get Sam and Eva back here to accompany me. Maybe we can meet them there. I'll call them."
Putting her ear to the door, she heard Amma's voice, "Keep safe Richard. You do realise there'll be watchers on the hotel here. Likely some are inside."
"Peter and Staffy are doing a circuit of our corridor and around the hotel outer. You know we wouldn't have stayed here if I had my way. We shouldn't be here now, we should have left from the cemetery."
"Kate deserves closure, Richard. This place has been her life, her home, that's been all she's had since her mother died, other than the times she spent with her father because he had visitation rights before she was eighteen, and then she's felt obliged when he wants to call or when he asks her to visit him. Her life was lonely and humdrum, but we didn't know about the gym, did we? Other than some casual friends at the church, there was only you, and me. Her mind was taken by you, Richard."
"Well, she's had her fairy-tale broken. I'm not who she imagined. I've grown up, but she hasn't."
Kate didn't wait to hear more. Falling on her bed, she wept as she realised how much he affected her and how badly she kept reacting to him. Then, thinking about the name 'Staffy', it reminded her of a breed of dog. Perhaps they have a Rottweiler too... She strove to smother the mirth she felt rising up within her. In doing so, she began weeping again.
My emotions are all askew, she told herself, just as Doctor Foreman said they'd be... I do so wish I could visit my home. I could go inside and hide. She smiled, thinking, I'd go down under the basement. They'd never find me there, not Richard, not Amma, not Jerry. I need a reprieve from all this... these people... my thoughts... I should see if I can sneak out of here and go home... With this thought in her head, she crossed to the window hoping she might climb out and then get down to the lower floor. Maybe there's a fire escape ladder...
Pushing the thick-rimmed glasses up like a hairband, her eyes first moved to the area past the hotel, upon which she could focus. There were a good number of cars in the hotel car-park around which she could move amongst to hide and thus gain access to the shrubs in the garden on the other side without being seen from here...
She frowned. Someone was squatting, placing something under the car they'd arrived in. Looking across at the other side of the car-park, she saw another man who looked like Jerry, doing the same thing to another of their rental cars.